Up For Adoption:Baby Stories to a Good Home (Fallout Edition)
by RosieSpectre
Summary: On a rainy day's stroll one day you make a fateful decision to turn down a small alleyway, a shortcut you swear, to find a soggy cardboard box. On the box is written in splotchy marker: "Up For Adoption:Baby Stories to a Good Home". Just as the box says, when you investigate further you find the shivering forms of neglected, unfinished stories crying out for a warm home.


Okay so I started this ages ago and never came back to it but I'd really like to see it carried on I guess? And so I'm making it the first installment of my 'Up For Adoption: Baby Stories to a Good Home'. I little context for this one, I love reincarnation fics, gamer aus and more recently, ocs, as a result I started writing this when I ran out of fics to read. If anyone wants to adopt this neglected baby, message me if you want more info on it and/or to tell me you've posted your first chapter of it ; ) Though I do ask that you credit me either way!

Disclaimer: I do not own Fallout 4

Warning: Death, mature language and themes

She'd been ill for ages. In and out of the hospital regularly, with one doctor diagnosing her with some disease, another with some rare unheard of disorder. Of all the doctors and specialists that her parents had shuttled her off to since she first became sick, not a single one could agree on what the hell was wrong with her.

At first, realising that her doctors knew maybe even less than she did about what was probably killing her was scary. Terrifying really, and heartbreaking. But after awhile, she felt all that fear and hurt turn to anger, Anger at the incompetence of the so-called 'experts'; anger at her family for making her go through this again and again every time a treatment failed. Eventually though, she was simply too exhausted to be angry anymore.

She was, however, able to find some relief by killing time playing video games and reading books. When she couldn't do either of those, she would daydream. Mostly about herself taking the place of the main characters, being healthy and strong. She liked to pretend that she wasn't stuck in a frail, useless body, but instead was a butt-kicking heroine from her books and games. Through games, stories and daydreams she could experience all the things she'd never get in real life: adventure, fame, even romance. It was a relief from the day to day pains and monotony.

It was during one of her daydreams that she got the news. Her medicine wasn't working, and the only thing left to try was surgery. Her parents had to consent, as she was still a minor, and they still had the ability to hope. So the surgery was scheduled, she was prepped, and the next day found her daydreaming once again. This time in a surgery theatre, with doctors all around her and her parents clutching onto each other in a small observation room up above. Why they were allowed in was a mystery to her but she was grateful, as it allowed her a chance to silently say her goodbyes. Just in case, of course. The anesthesiologist asked her to count down from 10. With silent goodbyes ringing in her ears and imaginary adventures flickering behind her eyelids, she counted.

10

9

8

The room seems to blur.

7

Her vision begins to fade to black.

6

5

All sounds dull to a soft hum.

4

3

She feels strange, tranquil somehow. Her constant companion, pain, is nothing but a distant shadow.

2

1

The world is dark, silent, and she feels nothing.

THIS IS A LINE BREAK/END CHAPTER?

When she comes to, she is freezing cold. It consumes her mind, how utterly bone piercingly cold she is. Her extremities were both painful and numb from it. She couldn't hear anything over the pounding of her heart, the muscle desperately struggling to keep her frozen blood flowing. Every breath feels like swallowing shattered glass. Still she pants heavily, desperate for air to fill her aching lungs. Her sole attempt at opening her eyes is halted immediately by blinding light before she can do more than squint with one eye.

Even in her hysterical state, she swears she hears the sound of a baby crying. Yelling. A loud pop that startled her badly enough that if she didn't have its beat in her ears, she'd think her heart had stopped. Crackling like snow being crushed surrounds her and air whooshes from her lungs as the cold somehow, impossibly, intensifies. Then darkness once more. This time the nothingness is a welcome relief.

Next time she wakes, the cold is not as intense. Her limbs still hurt and her body still struggles to function, but after several long moments she can literally feel herself defrosting. Through the fog of shock and the pulse roaring in her ears, she can hear an alarm? A woman's voice. Mechanical wiring and clicking sounds. Then something resembling silence. The roar of her heart eases, and soon all she hears is her breathing and the faint crackle of ice exposed to warmer air. One eye at a time, she squints at her surroundings. At first the light is blinding but as her eyes adjust she can see that she's inside some sort of padded tube with small lights in the bottom and top. The door to her tube is open, spilling mist into the dimly lit room beyond. Across from her she sees a row of pods, all shut tight and frosted over.

Confusion hits her like a battering ram. Where the fuck is she? Somewhere deep in her mind whispers in answer, The Vault. Her confusion only deepens, Vault? She was preparing for surgery just minutes ago! She was in a hospital in the middle of Chicago! What vault? It didn't look anything like how she imagined a bank vault would look. Where were the doctors? Where were her parents? Doctors? Hospital? No, she'd been visiting her family, they'd just had a baby. None of her family had had any babies recently, she had hardly any extended family anyway. Certainly none she could visit in her condition anyways.

Like a movie, memories played before her. The first, growing up with her parents in Florida, going to school, getting sick all the time, homeschooling, doctors visits that escalated into hospital stays, her body breaking down bit by bit, silent goodbyes, surgery, darkness. Then, to her shock, the memories continued, yet restarted? Growing up with people that claim to be her parents but they look nothing like them, living in Massachusetts, her 'parents' joining the military, the war, technology she'd never seen -nuclear power-, her parents funeral, living with her aunt and uncle, graduation, college- I was a business major-, visiting her family to meet the baby -Shaun?-, the emergency broadcast, running, Vault 111.

Realisation hits. She chokes and shakes her head as if it would erase the memories from it. It is impossible. Vault 111 is from a video game, her parents are alive, and she doesn't have any baby cousins damnit. Vaguely, she realizes she is hyperventilating. It takes a while but she slows her breathing. Just in case, she pinched her own cheeks, and whimpers in pain and distress. She isn't dreaming. She's awake. Is she crazy? Does radiation make you hallucinate? She doesn't think so. But then what the hell was going on. Had she...died in surgery? Had a mental breakdown? Why would her death be a vault, a whole world really, from a video game? One she'd never even finished at that! Oh god where are my family? Family? Uncle Nate, Aunt Nora, SHAUN! What? The family from the game…

She tries to recall the beginning of the game, a chill filling her chest when she connects the dots. Last time she woke up, those sounds! The game opens with the spouse dying-NO!- and the baby being kid-oh god not Shaun, he's just a baby-napped. Her head throbs, forcing her eyes shut and bringing her to clutching her head with both hands. Trying to remember more causes the pain to escalate until finally, with sobs echoing in her head, darkness takes her once more.

LINE BREAK FOR SURE MY DUDE

When she finally comes to (again) , it is blissfully painless. This time, she doesn't need to reach for the memories of what happened. She, and the voice, sit silent and limp in her tube, contemplating what to do now. Find my family damnit! They're dead. But are they really? The game only shows one dying, and there was no niece. There's hope then! Unlikely...the hero is the sole survivor and well we survived. But fine. They were given the chambers next to me and across. Wonderful I'm talking to myself. Maybe I am crazy? Later! Find my family!

She stands. Immediately she falls over, limbs numb and tingling like they'd all gone to sleep. Apparently cryogenic sleep isn't good for circulation, who would have guessed. When feeling seeps into her slow and painful, she tries again, one limb at a time. Left arm, right arm, left leg, right leg, slowly stand… Her balance is way off and she has to hold onto something to remain upright, but ultimately she is up. Step by stuttering step she approaches the tube next to her. The window is frosted over, melting too slowly for her to see anything. Damnit. Terminal. What? Doesn't the terminal have something about life support on it? A list of the occupants or something at least. It's difficult to see anything through the misty air and the overhead lights, and it takes a bit of graceless stumbling and slipping on the wet floor to finally spot the slight glow emitting from the terminal. Oh my god it's actually there? Did I see it on the way in? I must have. My life isn't a prologue to a fucking video game! She hobbles over to it, gripping the cryo chambers like a toddler learning to walk. The screen is black except for a flicking green bar in the top corner. She presses the enter key, hoping against hope that it'll be enough to prompt the machine to just give her what she wants.

To her profound relief, the screen begins to type out its welcome message and command prompts.

[Cryogenic Array]

[Life Support]

[Pod Occupant Status]

She selects the last.

C6 and C7! I was assigned C8, they'd moved Mr. Russel up to C1 so I could be near them.

[Occupant Status: Unknown - - Pod Door Manual Override Engaged] Shaun….Uncle Nate...oh god the baby crying They opened the pod -no- killed Nate -NO- and took baby Shaun. FUCK! Those bastards! I'll kill them, I-I'll rip them to shreds damnit! Nora… if Nate was dead it should have been her that lived, but none of the other pods were open?

[Occupant Status: Deceased. Cause of Death: Asphyxiation due to Life Support failure.]

No, no, nonononono! I can't be alone, they can't be dead! A sob rips through her, burning her throat and shaking her body violently. It's followed by another, and another, until she collapses to her knees, sobbing hysterically.

She'd died. Been reborn. Lost everything that mattered to her, in both lifetimes. She's lost, and terrified. What little she can remember of the game, fuck me, my life really is a fucking video game?, the world outside the vault has gone to shit. Monsters, raiders, robots, everything aiming to kill you for the hell of it. What do I do? What do we do? Get out. We have to get out. Stay here we starve and watch your-our family rot; out there we have a chance. Slim chance. Still a chance.

Gasping for breath and roughly wiping away tears and snot, she stands. She remembers how to open the pods now, and stumbles over to pull the latches on Nate and Nora's pods. She takes their wedding rings, she can't carry them out to bury them but she can bring a part of them with her. Maybe, when she can, she'll bury them somewhere and give them the closest thing to a funeral possible.

Admittedly, most of leaving the vault is a blur, broken up by brief moments of adrenaline fueled panic upon stumbling across the handful of radroaches living in the vault. They're easy enough to get rid of, once she found a security baton. The ammo, guns, and stimpacks to be found are stuffed as carefully as possible into her vault suit. Damn thing doesn't have any pockets and luckily she has a thin undershirt on under it, allowing her to unzip it partway without baring herself to the cold. I didn't want to get naked in front of the neighbors. It still fit though, barely. One of the first things she's doing on the outside is finding a change of clothes.

Outside. It's gonna be wilderness, ruins, and more wilderness out there. Where's she gonna sleep? Food will be a problem too. There's clean water in the vault so far so there's that at least. She finds herself of two minds about the place, on one hand what safer place on Earth was there now than an underground bunker meant to survive nuclear bombs? On the other, despite the beds, shelter, and clean water it's freezing and damp in here. Not to mention who knows if or when the electronics would give out or break. Wouldn't that just be her luck to set up camp here, just to have the door break behind her and be trapped with dozens of rapidly defrosting, and soon rotting, corpses. Including her current self's family. Still, it'd be a waste not to consider it. Later, when she can think without feeling like a shard of glass is piercing through her brain. Whatever fresh air there might be on the surface, maybe it'll help.


End file.
